This invention relates to the production of materials with useful magnetostrictive properties.
Magnetostriction is the property which relates magnetic characteristics of a body of material to a change of the shape of the material. The property is seen in the change in size of bodies of certain materials when the magnetic environment changes or the change in magnetic characteristic when a force is applied to such a body to change its shape. Magnetostriction is a dimensionless quantity represented by the magnetostriction constant .lambda..sub.S, relating magnetization and shape change and in the SI system of units useful values are some tens or hundreds of parts per million, particularly for use in sensors and transducers. For such uses a high magnetomechanical coupling factor is desirable. Also "soft" magnetic properties are generally preferred.
While thin film amorphous alloys and magnetic multilayers individually provide some of the required properties there is still a strong need for a significant improvement in the properties available and for materials which exhibit a useful combination of such properties.